As many predicted (including me), the Supreme Court unanimously slappped down the lower court injunctions based on claims that the Trump temporary travel restrictions on six Muslim countries were unconstitutional, writing,
But the injunctions reach much further than that: They also bar enforcement of §2(c) against foreign nationals abroad who have no connection to the United States at all. The equities relied on by the lower courts do not balance the same way in that context. Denying entry to such a foreign national does not burden any American party by reason of that party’s relationship with the foreign national. And the courts below did not conclude that exclusion in such circumstances would impose any legally relevant hardship on the foreign national himself. See id., at 762 (“[A]n unadmitted and nonresident alien . . . ha[s] no constitutional right of entry to this country”). So whatever burdens may result from enforcement of §2(c) against a foreign national who lacks any connection to this country,they are, at a minimum, a good deal less concrete than the hardships identified by the courts below.
At the same time, the Government’s interest in enforcing §2(c), and the Executive’s authority to do so, are undoubtedly at their peak when there is no tie between the foreign national and the United States. Indeed, EO–2 itself distinguishes between foreign nationals who have some connection to this country, and foreign nationals who do not, by establishing a case-by-case waiver system primarily for the benefit of individuals in the former category. See, e.g., §§3(c)(i)–(vi). The interest in preserving national security is “an urgent objective of the highest order.” Holder v. Humanitarian Law Project, 561 U. S. 1, 28 (2010). To prevent the Government from pursuing that objective by enforcing §2(c) against foreign nationals unconnected to the United States would appreciably injure its interests, without alleviating obvious hardship to anyone else.…The Government’s application to stay the injunction with respect to §§6(a) and (b) is accordingly granted in part. Section 6(a) may not be enforced against an individual seeking admission as a refugee who can credibly claim a bona fide relationship with a person or entity in the United States. Nor may §6(b); that is, such a person may not be excluded pursuant to §6(b), even if the 50,000 person cap has been reached or exceeded. As applied to all other individuals, the provisions may take effect.
Got that?
“To prevent the Government from pursuing that objective by enforcing §2(c) against foreign nationals unconnected to the United States would appreciably injure its interests, without alleviating obvious hardship to anyone else.”
The “obvious hardships” asserted by the lower courts, of course, were really the perceived burdens of having a President that Democrats, progressives and terrorism deniers didn’t want to recognize as legitimate, or permit to reverse Obama administration policies they favored The Court will hear the arguments that the order is unconstitutional in the Fall, but does not detect that urgency that the partisan courts did, and suggested that the issue may well be moot by then, since the administration will have had time to evaluate its travel policies.
This was an ominous episode in which partisan judges ruled that President’s Trump’s campaign rhetoric about “banning Muslims” precluded him from the power to do what any other President could do and in Obama’s case, had done. It was an invalid basis upon which to block the use of established and Constitutional Presidential powers, despite cheering from the news media and the Democrats. Significantly, SCOTUS rejected that biased approach, as it should have. Writes Alan Dershowitz, who also predicted that the injections would be struck down,
“The high court will recognize the implications of striking an otherwise legitimate ban because of what a President said when he was a candidate. To follow the lower court reasoning, the very same ban could be constitutional if issued by one president and unconstitutional if issued by another. That is not the way the law generally operates in this country.”
As much as Democrats wish otherwise….
Ethics Alarms 
INTERESTING!!!
It would be really interesting if someone went back and quoted a wide swath of Trump and other Republicans’ predictions about this and then compared them to a wide swath of predictions made by Democrats.
That would be a fun read.
I wonder if predictions from Democrats about this will start to vanish from the internet real soon.
No, this this fight is an essential one to the Left wing world-view.
I don’t understand how leaving predictions that turned out to be false available online could benefit their cause, where as removing them as if they never existed can portray others as liars when they can’t produce a link to the original to prove it?
I’ve actually run into this tactic before.
P.S. In the same way that I saw hateful comments being deleted after the backlash from Kathy Griffin’s severed Trump head photos, I’ve already begun to see prediction comments from Progressives on Facebook being deleted. The common phrase I’m hearing when someone mentions that these things were deleted is “prove it”. This is not the first time I’ve seen these tactics from Progressives; Progressives don’t like it one bit when their own words come back to haunt them, so they intentionally delete them whenever possible or just ignore that it was ever written or said. Last night someone that had openly been predicting that the Supreme Court would strike down the Travel Ban Executive Orders and Trump would be impeached as a result of the SCOTUS decision look me straight in the eye and lie saying that they never said it; I put my finger in their face and said “you sir are a liar” and walked out the door.
There is a great plugin that will archive stuff like this. You would then have to keep track of your archived links, but if you were so inclined. It is an archive.is plugin, I am sure you can find it on the chrome store, or whatever browser you use.
Speaking of… Have you seen the Minimum Wage story making the rounds?
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/seattles-minimum-wage-hike-may-have-gone-too-far/
“In January 2016, Seattle’s minimum wage jumped from $11 an hour to $13 for large employers, the second big increase in less than a year. New research released Monday by a team of economists at the University of Washington suggests the wage hike may have come at a significant cost: The increase led to steep declines in employment for low-wage workers, and a drop in hours for those who kept their jobs. Crucially, the negative impact of lost jobs and hours more than offset the benefits of higher wages — on average, low-wage workers earned $125 per month less because of the higher wage, a small but significant decline.”
Who’da fuckin’ thought, right? It’s almost like I’ve been saying that for a decade now. Jesus I’m old.
But I won’t hold my breath waiting for progressives to become aware of the obvious.
Humble Talent wrote, “But I won’t hold my breath waiting for progressives to become aware of the obvious.”
I’ve already read Progressive hacks, yes hacks [ 😉 ] completely ignoring the obvious and blaming the lost jobs and shorter hours on greedy wealthy (some actually saying Republican) executives trying to maintain profit margins for stockholders simply so they can get their million dollar bonus checks. On the other hand; I’ve also heard that companies are seeing the writing on the wall and making serious inquiries about automation products and that might stimulate big spending in other industries for the short term thus permanently eliminating the availability of some jobs for the long term.
What Progressives don’t seem to fully understand is that it’s entirely possible to completely price oneself out of a job in certain industries – permanently.
Way to go with the large percentage minimum wage increases Progressives, you’re destroying jobs; wait, maybe that was their goal, destroy the lives of the working poor and blame it all on the wealthy and Rethuglicans thus further dividing the population into more oppressed groups; hmmmmmm………….
Arithmetic has no mercy.
I think headlines and articles a disappeared when optics are bad, like trash-talking Otto Warmbier. Getting predictions wrong on hills the Left will die on are not bad optics.
I’m officially swearing off Twitter for the rest of the week. I have no appetite to watch Trump gloat in real time, nor the stomach for the incessant apoplexy from progressives that will immediately follow it.
That said… It was the right decision. Obviously so.
Crazy nonsense having to debate whether a country has a right to secure its borders. Scary political reality that the lower courts abdicated their responsibilities without much hue and cry. Sadly, “connection” and “bona fide” are sufficiently ambiguous that the crazy nonsense will continue as politics erodes the legal structure of separation of powers. It seems we are on the road to handing back everything wrested from the old English monarchs. Notwithstanding, in the immortal words of Ice Cube, today was a good day!
In the meantime the mayor of my state’s largest city signs a 10-page executive order granting sweeping protections to “undocumented citizens” as he calls them, and scoffs at “Mr. 45” as essentially powerless.
Would an appropriate headline be “Conservatives on Supreme Court Vote to Stop Refugees” with the first paragraph of the article being the poem at the base of the Statue of Liberty?
I’m just trying to get the hang of journalism these days.
Hardly. The decision was Unanimous 9-0.
So the conservatives voted to stop refugees?
That would be a deceitful headline, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see it.
Sweet. I’m putting my resume in for slate or salon.
Thomas wrote a partial dissent for Alito and Gorsuch. If you can’t frame a headline as a Court rebuke to them, you’re not trying.
That would be a whole separate article spinning a whole separate set of facts.
But I like where you’re going.
“Supreme Court Neuters Travel Ban” would be an accurate headline, as the court ruled that for now the ban cannot restrict travelers with a “bona fide relationship” to a US citizen; presumably that would include the majority of travelers from the six countries named in the travel ban.
But I haven’t seen any mainstream publications go with that negative a headline so far.
Wild conspiracy theory:
Backroom dealings to get Trump’s back scratched so Trump doesn’t throw the court thoroughly conservative if/when Kennedy retires or when Ginsburg passes on.
Yup. Wild.
Can’t we have a little fun around here?
The unanimous vote was to hear the case in October. I don’t think anyone knows how they come down on the ban itself.
*And to stay the injunctions. Which means the government (Trump admin) has a better than likely chance of winning on the merits in the next term.
No, they blocked the injunction, meaning that the order goes forward. It was already going to be heard in October. I did provide the link.
And how have you been? We missed you.
They did not block it completely. I think it’s a slight exaggeration to say that they slapped it down when they are allowing those with ties and commitments in the United States to come in. I think it’s fair for Trump to claim this as a victory, and I think it makes sense as long as it is temporary and they strengthen the vetting process, if that’s what they intend to do.
I’m fine, thanks. I join others in feeling the tone of those here critical of the Left is one of broad brush strokes, which makes me reluctant to comment. There are those of us who wish to concentrate on policy and not on scandals and tweets, and are embarrassed by some of the behavior displayed by those opposed to Trump. But there is definitely an echo chamber quality to the blog, and the disparaging remarks and insults are not my cup of tea. It’s my choice not to participate; my skin is just not thick enough. I think others have made the same decision, although for different reasons. I come here regularly, learn a lot and know whose remarks to skip and whose express my views much more articulately than I ever could.
The MSM is trying to highlight the contacts exception but its a minor issue. The main thing is that order goes into effect, and the theory that what a President says about an order matters more than the four corners of the document, which was a totally contrived way to get around the law by 9th circuit, the Hawaiian judge and the rest. If even justices like Ginsberg, who is the most partisan judge on the Court, and Sotomayor, who is happy to use touchy-feelyism to get to a desired result, couldn’t back the partisan injunctions, then we know the injunctions were inexcusable, and those judges are unethical hacks.
Jack, I’ve gotta agree with Jan here. I detached myself from the news yesterday, and your article suggested to me that the Court went further than it actually did. Your headline is much, much more biased and sensationalist than the headlines in the New York Times or CNN, though obviously in the other direction. Of course, you don’t have the same duty to be unbiased as they do, but reading the stories in the MSM today I think the headline “Supreme Court Pointed Out That The Courts Blocking The Trump Temporary Travel Ban Were Playing Partisan Politics, Not Objectively And Ethically Doing Their Jobs” is completely unsupportable spin.
Their decision wasn’t even completely unanimous–the conservative members joined a partial dissent arguing that the injunctions should have been slapped down in full. The court’s decision that travelers with a “bona fide relationship” to a US citizen are currently exempt from the ban means the majority of travelers from the banned countries will likely be allowed in–how is that not a defeat for the Trump administration? And of course, the court did not rule on the constitutionality of the ban, and won’t do so until October–after the ban itself expires. There is no way to judge from this decision whether or not the Court thinks the order is constitutional.
But I wouldn’t have known any of this from just your article, and 35 comments in, no one has pointed these relevant facts out.
Boy, you are taking Deery lessons in spin. The opinion regarding the part of the order that was being slapped down was unanimous, and the rejection of the Ninth Circuit’s non-legal rationalization for striking it down was unanimous. And that was what the headline referred to, correctly. The Post et al. are trying to make the SCOTUS rejection sound equivocal. It isn’t even the one exception has nothing to do with the alleged religious discrimination.
The opinion regarding the part of the order that was being slapped down was unanimous,
The key phrase here is “the part of the order.” You stated at the opening of your article:
As many predicted (including me), the Supreme Court unanimously slappped down the lower court injunctions…
But they only struck down part of the lower court injunctions. As I said, the majority of travelers from the six affected countries will still be able to travel here because of the Court’s decision to allow those with a “bona fide” relationship the US citizens to come here. (To be fair, this part of the decision is quoted in your post, you just didn’t emphasize it.)
and the rejection of the Ninth Circuit’s non-legal rationalization for striking it down was unanimous.
Nowhere in the decision does the court say or imply the Ninth Circuit was engaging in “non-legal rationalizations;” this is your spin.
The Post et al. are trying to make the SCOTUS rejection sound equivocal.
It IS equivocal! They only struck down a part of the injunctions, and the version of the ban they are allowing is far, far more narrow than the order Trump actually signed. If most of the travelers from the six affected countries can still travel here, how can you say their rejection of the injunctions was unequivocal? That is far more misleading than pointing out the fact that it is equivocal.
It isn’t even the one exception has nothing to do with the alleged religious discrimination.
Huh?
You don’t think things have calmed down since the battles of Obamacare and Gay Marriage?
Here’s how the NY Times handled the story — small type, sixth story on the page, following “Health Bill in Peril as G.O.P. Support Wanes after Report,” three stories elaborating on that one, and a feature entitled “Australia through American Eyes”:
Travel Ban, Partly Reinstated, Goes to Supreme Court
In a partial win for President Trump, the court said a limited travel ban could take effect, and agreed to take a case…”
“Ho hum. No story here. Who cares?” says the Times.
You said yourself that the story is on the front page. You really think that represents a “who cares?” attitude?
Come on, man.
When we want to use a comic showing someone slapping someone else, we use Batman slapping Robin.
http://stfuhero.com/meme/8015/supreme-court
Who’s “we,” Nerd-Face?
It’s been an Internet rule since about 2008.
P.S. I’m just teasing-I hope that’s clear, sometimes tone gets lost in text.
It was clear, but it never hurts to make sure.
Jack:
This was an ominous episode in which partisan judges ruled that President’s Trump’s campaign rhetoric about “banning Muslims” precluded him from the power to do what any other President could do and in Obama’s case, had done.
This is fake news, Jack. Obama never did anything like Trump’s travel ban.
Obama did not “ban visas for refugees from Iraq for six months,” as Trump said — refugees don’t travel on visas. Rather, the Obama administration dramatically slowed the processing of refugee requests and “Special Immigrant Visas,” meant for Iraqi interpreters who helped US forces, while it expanded its screening procedures.
During that time, the Obama administration also reexamined 58,000 Iraqi refugees who had already been admitted to the US, according to a 2012 congressional hearing. New Iraqi refugees were continuously admitted throughout the year, albeit at a much slower pace than usual.
According to data from the State Department’s Refugee Processing Center, 6,339 Iraqi refugees arrived in the US in 2011 — fewer than half the numbers admitted in 2010 and in 2012.
“While the flow of refugees slowed significantly during the Obama administration’s review, refugees continued to be admitted to the United States during that time, and there was not a single month in which no Iraqis arrived here,” Jon Finer, who served as chief of staff to Secretary of State John Kerry and was the director of policy planning at the State Department, wrote in Foreign Policy.
http://www.businessinsider.com/big-differences-between-trumps-immigration-ban-obamas-2011-policy-2017-2/#scope-1
The article points out other differences between the two policies as well.
I didn’t quote Trump, and Obama did limit immigration from a specific nation into the United States on a temporary basis. I know that PolitiFact and the MSM rushed to distinguished the two actions, but in the sense I was referring to, their arguments were rationalizations, as is yours. Both actions stemmed from the same powers held by the President that have never been denied or challenged. Both actions restricted immigration base on perceived threats to the nation, and whether Obama’s threat was “rea” and Trump’s wasn’t (in the assessment of Trump critics) makes no difference whatsoever. What I said is accurate.
On a side note, the reflex efforts you make to try to weaken or deny a legitimate point by tangential nit-picking and this kind of spinning is exhausting, wastes my time, and shows an inability to process information that disproves your favorite partisan stances, and questionable objectivity. Both Obama and Trump temporarily halted travel for what was in their judgment, valid national security measures.
Don’t you dare call that “fake news.”
Jack,
This was your statement:
This was an ominous episode in which partisan judges ruled that President’s Trump’s campaign rhetoric about “banning Muslims” precluded him from the power to do what any other President could do and in Obama’s case, had done.
I stand by what I said: the above statement is false. It implies that President Obama took actions identical or nearly identical to Trump’s actions. He did not.
Saying that both presidents “limited” or “restricted” immigration is using weasel words. Trump temporarily banned immigration from seven countries. Obama did not. Trump’s order affected the visa program. Obama’s did not.
There is plenty of reason to make this distinction, and it is legally relevant.
The Immigration and Nationality Act states that “no person shall receive any preference or priority or be discriminated against in the issuance of an immigrant visa because of the person’s race, sex, nationality, place of birth, or place of residence.”
Trump’s executive order clearly violates that section of the INA. Obama’s order was about refugees, and thus had nothing to do with visas. CONCLUSION: Trump’s order violated the law, while Obama’s did not.
You may see that distinction as “nitpicking.” I think it’s important. We’ll see what the Court decides in October.
“precluded him from the power to do what any other President could do and in Obama’s case, had done.”
Very clear. You are reading this as saying
“precluded him from doing what Obama had done.”
That’s not what I said, nor what I was referring to. I was referring to the Presidential power which was being denied to Trump. I was very clear.
Read.
“precluded him from the power to do what any other President could do and in Obama’s case, had done.”
Very clear. You are reading this as saying
“precluded him from doing what Obama had done.”
Because that is what it says! And you already confirmed with your 12:09 comment that that is what you meant. I can’t believe you’re trying to go back on your own words now and make this seem like a reading comprehension failure on my part.
“precluded him from the power to do what any other President, including Obama, could have done” would refer only to power, and not actual actions. But “precluded him from the power to do what any other President could do and in Obama’s case, had done” means “Obama has used this power to do the same thing.” And I know that’s what you meant, because you said so in your comment at 12:09.
Besides, as I just showed you, Trump does not have the power to limit visa admissions based on nation of origin. That is against the law. How did you miss that? So even if you did just mean that Obama had the power to do what Trump did, you’d be wrong. No president since that language was added in 1965 has had that power.
No, it doesn’t, and again, this is pure spin. The power would allow Trump to do what Obama had done, and absence of the power would prevent Trump from doing what Obama had done. The 9th Circuit’s position would allow Obama to do what he had done, but would not allow Trump to do the equivalent of similar, using the same powers.
The essence of Obama’s order was to restrict travel from a dangerous place in for a limited time. Trump’s order did the same. Both actions are based in the exact same Presidential power, and again, it’s a tangent and a deflection of the issue.
Democrats and left-wing partisans used the courts to illegally deny this President the same powers Obama could use and did. The Supreme Court, as I said it would, unanimously slapped that effort down. Using the same powers Obama used to block travel from Iraq, Trump is using to block travel from 6 countries with a large terrorist population. What was at issue in the case was the President’s power to do this, and the courts said he did not. The power was and is the issue. The judgements and circumstances underlying that use is not a judge’s job to question. Nor yours. Thus how similar Obama’s travel ban and Trump’s are is completely beside the point, and I never attempted to compare them in the original statement. You attempted to claim that the difference between the two actions was a material distinction. Not as far as the law goes.
I literally just showed you, twice, the legal distinction between what Obama did and what Trump did. Why do you keep proclaiming that legal difference immaterial? Why are you saying it is not the court’s job to judge whether or not an executive order complies with the law?
Andy McCarthy at National Review nicely demonstrates why your contention is false, Chris. Here’s the crux of the biscuit:
This, in my view, is exactly right. Congress cannot bind the executive in matters of national security and foreign affairs, which are explicitly his domain. But even if you were to reject that straightforward constitutional fact, there is this:
The end.
Thanks, Glenn, for responding to my arguments about the law in question.
I find it odd that conservatives are now arguing that the president has unlimited authority regarding immigration. Many of Obama’s executive orders regarding immigration were challenged by Republicans in Congress. If the president is not bound by congressional statutes when crafting immigration law, then were these challenges devoid of merit? If Obama had wanted to sign an executive order establishing completely open borders, could he have done so? If nor, why not?
I find McCarthy’s argument unconvincing, and in a few places, he flat-out sabotages his own argument.
For example, he writes:
Even on its face, this provision is not as clearly in conflict with Trump’s executive order as Bier suggests. As he correctly points out, the purpose of the anti-discrimination provision (signed by President Lyndon Johnson in 1965) was to end the racially and ethnically discriminatory “national origins” immigration practice that was skewed in favor of Western Europe. Trump’s executive order, to the contrary, is in no way an effort to affect the racial or ethnic composition of the nation or its incoming immigrants. The directive is an effort to protect national security from a terrorist threat, which, as we shall see, Congress itself has found to have roots in specified Muslim-majority countries.
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/444371/donald-trump-muslim-alien-ban-legal
Here McCarthy seems to be suggesting that the intent of the law matters–but this is exactly what Jack and the other conservatives here have been disputing all along. Several statements from Trump and those who helped craft the executive order, such as Steve Bannon and Rudy Guliani, imply that the goal absolutely was to affect the ethnic composition of our nation.
Does the intent matter, or doesn’t it?
Then, McCarthy attempts to use Obama-era restrictions on Iraqi and Syrian applicants to the Visa Waiver Program to argue that the INA was violated by Obama. But the INA specifically prohibits discrimination against national origin or place of residence in the issuance of a visa. Applicants to the Visa Waiver Program obviously do not get a visa, so that portion of the INA would not apply. Yet McCarthy thinks he has just proven that Obama violated the statute, therefore it’s OK for Trump to do so as well.
I remain unconvinced that the president does not have to abide by the restrictions laid out in the INA. But we’ll see what the Supreme Court says in October.
No, intent doesn’t matter, if an act is within the power given to the President. And words do not accurately define intent. Courts evaluate laws and order by what they say and do and official records, not off the cuff remarks.
I have never suggested that “:the president has unlimited authority regarding immigration.” Nor have I heard anyone assert that, other than President Obama, who tried to overturn the immigration laws by EO.
The reason you say nonsense like this— “Several statements from Trump and those who helped craft the executive order, such as Steve Bannon and Rudy Guliani, imply that the goal absolutely was to affect the ethnic composition of our nation”—is because you refuse to concede that sufficient numbers of Muslims=more risk of terrorism. The objective of the order is to minimize the numbers of terrorists. Unfortunately, since Islam is an extreme and violent cult, that means policies that affect Muslims adversely. They need t address that. There is no Muslim ban, and never has been. The order is directly in line with the law of the land.
No, intent doesn’t matter, if an act is within the power given to the President. And words do not accurately define intent. Courts evaluate laws and order by what they say and do and official records, not off the cuff remarks.
Courts absolutely do.
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/court-strikes-down-north-carolina-voter-id-law-226438
I have never suggested that “:the president has unlimited authority regarding immigration.” Nor have I heard anyone assert that, other than President Obama, who tried to overturn the immigration laws by EO.
You didn’t read the McCarthy quotes Glenn posted? It plainly says that the president has the authority to circumvent congressional statute on immigration law.
If you don’t agree that the president has unlimited authority regarding immigration, then can you please explain why you think the relevant portion of the INA I showed you does not make Trump’s travel ban unlawful?
The reason you say nonsense like this— “Several statements from Trump and those who helped craft the executive order, such as Steve Bannon and Rudy Guliani, imply that the goal absolutely was to affect the ethnic composition of our nation”—is because you refuse to concede that sufficient numbers of Muslims=more risk of terrorism. The objective of the order is to minimize the numbers of terrorists. Unfortunately, since Islam is an extreme and violent cult, that means policies that affect Muslims adversely. They need t address that. There is no Muslim ban, and never has been
All irrelevant, even if true. The INA doesn’t say “no person shall receive any preference or priority or be discriminated against in the issuance of an immigrant visa because of the person’s race, sex, nationality, place of birth, or place of residence, unless the president thinks there are good reasons to do so.” It says what it says. Glenn has at least provided an explanation for why the president doesn’t have to follow this law. You seem to disagree with this explanation, but you’ve provided none of your own.
So? Why do you think the president has the authority to ignore this law?
Politico is a biased source, Chris. I get to use Breitbart if you use Politico.
That’s a ridiculous false equivalence, slick. Politico has a slightly left-of-center bias. Breitbart is a far right garbage fire. Besides, there are no perfectly unbiased sources out there, and Politico isn’t even as biased toward the Left as NYT or WaPo, which have to be used as sources as they contain tons of breaking stories. Your standard is unreasonable. But if you want to keep using Breitbart as a source, be my guest. You will only be misinforming yourself.
Anyway, I only used it to show that courts considered intent in deciding on voter ID cases, which is a fact you can confirm with a variety of other sites.
Chris,
As is often the case, your understanding of ‘left-of-center’ and mine are not the same. Brietbart has been smeared by the left media (who do exactly the same things) such that any good reporting they do is suspect just based on leftist propaganda. Politico has pulled many of the same stunts Brietbart has been accused of, with little blowback.
Not looking to argue: we agree to disagree.